


Some Like It Hotstuck

by Broba



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Comedy, Crack, Other, cross dressing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-05
Updated: 2014-10-21
Packaged: 2018-02-19 23:41:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2407202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Broba/pseuds/Broba
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kinkmeme prompt! For various violent, suit-of-card-themed reasons, Eridan finds himself on the run and under cover, in more ways then one. Laughs! Thrills! Crack! And I don't want to hear it about how very non-canon it all is. Some like it hot.... stuck!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

The first sign that the band was ready to really swing came when the drum beat started. Without warning the drummer began pounding the tom-tom an urgent, driving jungle beat the cut through the entire dance hall and when he added in the hiss of cymbals all the faces turned to the stage automatically. Next came the piping shrill horn section, blaring into life with an explosive crash of music.

_Bang bang BANG, bang bang BANG!_

The trilling horns laid down a sickly sweet, thrilling line of fire through the melody and at that point the double-bass kicked in with a vengeance. The bassist slapped and yanked at the strings like he wanted to kill the instrument, and yet the throbbing hum of bass beats came out strong, clear and thick as molasses.

The clarinet picked up the tune and held it, turning the whole thing on its' head with a sinuous, twisting snake-like note that wrapped the whole outfit up in the passion of raw, jumping swing. The tenor saxophonist opened up with a brutal solo that git the entire hall standing up. The tune was wordless up until that point, but when the spotlight raced across the stage a singer span on his heel and gripped the mike, practically colliding with it. He pulled the mike in close, practically caressing it as he spat out the words.

_Keep your cigarette lit, don't have to speak,_  
 _Keep your girl down by your side,_  
 _But your feet belong to me tonight,_  
 _Gonna take 'em for a ride!_

The floor erupted. Men in the sharpest of suits, women with curls twisted to perfection, they crowded onto the floor and began pounding the floorboards to the irresistible swinging beat.

_Leave your hat up on your head,_  
 _Don't need to drop your coat,_  
 _But your feet belong to me tonight,_  
 _And you ain't gonna get no vote!_

The band leader started scatting wildly accompanied by the band who encouraged him with throaty roars of assent with each line. The glasses shook upon the tables and spilled their whiskey and gin. Smoke filled the air from a hundred cigarettes and two hundred feet span, leapt, landed and stomped their way through the night.

_Bang bang BANG, bang bang BANG!_

Underneath the club, a ramp led down from street level to an underground car park. A glossy-black sedan slid between the concrete posts and bollards like a hunting shark, slowly moving from aisle to aisle. Suddenly, in the twin headlamp beams, a figure of a man was silhouetted. With a scream, he span and ran. The driver gunned the engine and gave chase.

The bassist span his instrument on it's single prong and slapped the strings hard, the saxophone let out a screeching, plaintive wail. The tune was drawing up to a crescendo, partly what they had practised before and partly made up of the beats and shrieks that the band was coming up with on the fly, and the people loved it.

_Bang bang BANG, bang bang BANG!_

The car screeched to a halt. The running man slammed against a blank concrete wall and turned with dread. He had nowhere to go and he knew it.  
“I didn't do it, I swear! I never said nothin', you gots ta believe me!”

The passenger side door opened, and a huge figure got out- he towered easily over the cowering man in the headlights, and in one meaty fist he gripped a Thompson gun.  
“Well ain't that a liberty,” he remarked, “youse tellin' us what we gots ta do, now?”  
“ I didn't mean it that way, Boxcars! You know I'm a straight-up guy, I'm the straight dope I swear!”

'Hearts' Boxcars walked around the car and opened the passenger door in back. From the inky blackness within a shorter man stepped out, this one with a jagged scar down the side of his face running like the track of a teardrop from under an eyepatch down his cheek.  
“Ain't that the truth, Boxcars? Ain't that a fuckin' liberty?”

“Slick!” He was openly pleading now, “I'm begging ya, man! Come on, you can't shoot a cat on his knees, can ya? Listen to me, I'm begging ya!”  
'Spades' Slick produced his own pistol and gestured. From the car the remainder of his cohort, 'Diamonds' and 'Clubs' disembarked, both armed.  
“See, here's the thing, Charlie. I wanna believe you, I really do,” Slick murmured, as he lit up a cigarette, “but ya see, this is business.”  
“You can't do this, man! We was partners!”  
“That right, Charlie?”  
“That's right, Slick! You and me, Spades and Knaves!”  
Slick rolled his eye and glanced at his buddies. Boxcars was stoic and unmoving. Clubs was assembling the pieces of what looked like an antique arquebus out of a violin case. Diamonds gave him a sour look, and just shrugged.  
“Well here's what I'm gonna do for ya, Charlie.” Slick cocked his pistol with a smirk, “I promise I ain't gonna enjoy it too much.”

The band crashed into the end of their act, and the musicians all took a bow. The crowd had already moved toward the bar, to their tables, to each other. When the music wasn't playing, they weren't interested. It was expected, it was just another night in the club. The musicians took up their instruments and made their way from the stage, where already another act was waiting in the wings to take over.

The band made their way through the Stygian back-passages behind the stage. The double-bassist struggled with his instrument, nearly hitting the saxophonist sprawling.  
“Hey! Watch it!”  
“Oh, thorry man, didn't thee you there.”  
“Yeah right. What a night, you see those cats jump?”  
“Pretty good night,”  
“Are you kiddin' me? We were on fire! Listen, we're ready for the big time, just like I've been sayin'!”  
“Sure sure,” the basssist brushed him off, “that'th what you alwayth thay.”  
“Yeah and I'm always right, too! Ain't you got a ounce a' ambition in you, Solly?”

Sollux set down his double bass against the crumbling plaster wall with a sigh and ran a hand through his hair, brushing down a few stray strands that had escaped his pomade.  
“I'd love to his the big time, okay? I'd love to thee my name up there in lightth and dine on lobster and champagne every night. Hell, throw in a dame or two! But it'th not gonna jutht happen, okay? Thtop living in a dream world.”  
Eridan waggled his eyebrows maddeningly and danced about, snapping his fingers.  
“It ain't gonna happen 'till we make it happen, Solly-boy! You saw them out there, they loved us!”  
“”And they'll love the next guyth too and the oneth after that. C'mon, let's get out of here, I need a coffee.”  
“You got it buddy, you an' me!”

Eridan threw an arm round Sol's shoulder, his saxophone dangling rakishly from his neck by its' strap, and the two of them made their way to the dressing room to pick up their things. As jobbing musicians, they tended to carry their most expensive and treasured possessions with them at all times and getting their stuff boxed up quickly was a practised art. Even so, Sol's double bass case was awkward and difficult to manoeuvre through the door. Eridan swirled his coat around his shoulders and adjusted his scarf, watching himself carefully in the mirror. He finally adjusted his glasses and gave his hair a quick seeing-to with the comb he always seemed to have handy in an inside pocket. Sollux tended to just button his coat tight and be satisfied with cramming his porkpie hat on haphazardly.

“Say,” Eridan looked around as they made their way out of their dressing room, “where's Charlie Knaves anyway? He said he'd get us what he owes us for the week tonight, right? It was tonight wasn't it? I'm pretty sure he said tonight. Is it the fifteenth or the sixteenth, I forget.”  
Sol was tired and grumpy after a jumping set and groaned.  
“Tonight! It'th the thixthteeth, you know it'th the thixthteeth, he thaid tho thith morning, remember? Thaturday the thixthteeth.”  
“Yeah well,” Eridan looked around vaguely, “where is that guy, anyways?”

Down in the parking lot, Charlie Knaves was begging for his life, ineffectually.  
“Guys! Guys! Don't it count for nothin'? All the times? Ain't there no old times sake?”  
This time 'Diamonds' Droog answered him.  
“Ain't no old times, Charlie. Ain't no tomorrow, neither. At least, not today there ain't.”

The others hesitated, thinking that last, gnomic statement through.  
“Hey Diamonds,” rumbled Boxcars, “that's some kind of existential frame-of-reference stuff right there!”  
Clubs yelled and waved his comically oversized arquebus.  
“Shut up shut up shut up! We gonna ice this mook or what?”  
Spades waved his pistol in the air and took careful aim.  
“Now yer talkin! Time to say night-night, Charlie! Sorry it had to be like this but hey- better luck next life, right?”

Eridan and Sollux burst out of the stage door leading into the car park, still bickering. They were just in time to see the Suits Gang gun down their putative employer, Charlie Knaves. The air echoed with the retort of automatic weapons fire and the blazing roar of an antique arquebus. The two musicians just stood rooted to the spot in shock and horror.

_Bang bang BANG, bang bang BANG!_

“Charlie!” Sollux cried out before thinking, before reasoning how unwise he was to do so. The gangsters turned as one towards them. Clubs was already feeding lead shot into the flared trumpet-barrel of his arquebus menacingly. Spades Slick held out his pistol, pointing at them dreadfully.  
“Youse guys,” he said slowly, “youse is dead guys.”

The newest band up on the stage of the club roared into a jumping swing beat and started to wail. As one, the dancers got up on tired feet and got into it. Down below, Eridan and Sollux ran for their lives, diving back through the stage door and charging down unlit dank corridors, barging past showgirls in their feathers and slicked-back music men. Behind them, the Suits Gang gave pursuit through unfamiliar territory. The two musicians had seen too much, and by the code of the street that meant they were fair game.

“And that's how it happened! We hopped a cab and came right here!”  
Eridan collapsed with a sigh into an artful, raffia-work chair, and gratefully accepted a tumbler of whiskey offered by Sol. In front of them was a desk with neatly arranged writing implements and a stack of papers, behind which sat their theatrical agent. She didn't seem impressed.  
“Well boys, this is a fine to-do. You realise, you can't stay in town. I don't even like having you in here.”  
Eridan leaned forwards, balancing his elbows on his knees and gave her his best puppydog eyes, the look that never failed him.  
“Aw come on, Kan. We're beggin' you here, you got to help us out- you wouldn't turn us out onto the streets to die, would you?”  
Kanaya Maryam, theatrical entrepreneur extraordinaire, steepled her fingers and thought seriously about doing exactly that. In all honesty, these boys had been little but trouble for her since she had taken them on. She liked to think of her performers as an extended family, and she was definitely looking at the two black sheep.  
“I'd love to help you, really I would, but you know how it goes in this town. The Suits have their fingers in all the pies up and down the club circuit, I can't afford to get in bad with that kind of heat. You see the kind of jam this is?”  
“It's a tholid thtraight-up jam,” Sol groaned, “we're gonna be pushing up daithieth by morning, dig?”  
“Dig,” agreed Eridan gravely.  
“Now just hold your horses there boys, I never said it was all that. You may have lost your visiting privileges in town, but that just means you have to think differently. You two need to lay low a while, and you'll never make it on the lam round here. You need to skit, skedaddle, hop a rail and make tracks, see?”  
“Aw come on Kan,” Eridan sighed, “we ain't got the dough to make it out of the scene. We ain't even got paid for the work we did for Charlie Knaves, how are we supposed to make enough scratch to hole up out in the sticks?”

Kanaya leant back in her chair and delicately fitted a slender cigarette from a silver case into a stylish ebony holder. She held the stem delicately between her lips and lit a match from a box on the desk.  
“Well, maybe there is a way,” she said slowly, “but you're not going to like it.”  
Sollux practically leaped out of his seat, “thpill, thithter! We'll take anything, thee?”  
“Anything?”  
“Thtraight dope, I thwear!”  
“All right just stay cool, Jackson. Here's the skinny- maybe I have a paying gig, room and board, for a sax and saw-fiddle two-piece. A real sweet deal out in the boonies. You just have to show up, play a couple of shows with a big band in some resort hotel, and by the time you're done maybe the heat will be off and you can come right on back to town.”

Eridan and Sollux shared a glance and nodded at each other. Eridan practically gushed at her.  
“That sounds perfect! We'll take it!”  
“Just take a seat and slow your beat, Jackson. I told you that you wouldn't like it...”  
“What'th not to like?” Sol frowned suspiciously.  
“Here's the thing,” she sighed, “it's an all-girl band. Females only. Dames galore. Strictly a ladies-only deal.”  
“Oh.”  
“Oh.”  
“What'th the point of that? Why'd you even get our hopeth up?”  
Kanaya held up a finger and got up, walking across her office to where her massive wardrobe awaited, along with two full racks of costumery.  
“I said you wouldn't like it, boys. If you want the job, then we're going to have to make some changes.”  
Eridan and Sollux shared a fearful glance.  
“She ain't for real, is she?”  
“I think she'th theriouth!”  
“Can we pull it off?”  
“You want to exthplan yourthelf to Thpadeth Thlick if we can't?”  
“Good point!”

The whistle on the steam-train blasted shrilly, alerting the passengers on the waiting platform. Travellers mingled and swayed towards the waiting carriage doors, and handlers in smart uniforms manhandled luggage aboard. By the waiting train a large gaggle of girls shrieked and laughed as they got ready to embark, it was all a fine adventure. At the head of the group, a rather hassled and bedraggled looking man was trying to corral the band.  
“Um, everyone? Could I, immediately, have your attention, please?”  
No one could hear him and even if they had been listening, the shout of the train conductor ordering all passengers aboard drowned him out. The girls moved as one, surging toward the crowd and threatening to knock their long suffering manager over in the stampede.

“Coo-ee! Wait for us, sorry we're late, girls!”  
A shrill, piping voice cut across the platform. Some of the girls turned to look, and soon they were all nudging each other with elbows, and pointing. Coming toward them across the platform were two stragglers, one of them carrying a saxophone case and one bravely carting a double-bass. The taller one with the glasses had on a rather lovely dark frock with a pattern of pink and white flowers. The smaller one with the double-bass had on a rather fetching yellow number with baby-blue polka-dots. There was certainly something a little odd about the pair though, they tottered and staggered across the concourse on heels that seemed unfamiliar and difficult to navigate in.

One of the band members leaned over to whisper to the girl next to her.  
“Who are these two?”  
“I don't know... I heard we were looking for some new players for the band...”  
“Well. What do you know about that.”

Eridan waved gaily as they tottered over to the train, while Sollux struggled along next to him, concentrating on keeping hold of the large double-bass case while balancing on what felt like a pair of stilts.  
“Thith ithn't going to work, I'm gonna break an ankle!”  
Eridan patted his arm and trilled, “daaaarling, you're doing fine! Just relax, we're nearly there dear!”  
Sollux glanced up at him, “okay, I'll thay it. Thith ith already getting weird.”


	2. Chapter 2

The entire carriage was filling up with the girls of Sweet Serket And Her Swinging Sirens, for that was the name of the band. The Swinging Sirens were a decidedly mixed bunch, incorporating some old hands who had stuck with the act for several years mixed with various journeyman performers who were brought in to fill out the numbers as needed. The band was led by the eponymous Sweet Serket, a ferocious and doughty female who ruled with a rod of iron and a vicious baton-wrist action. As the ladies of the band filed into their seats she strode up and down the aisle of the carriage, counting heads and reading out the rules by which she expected her ladies to behave.

“Now listen here you pack of giggling ninnies, my name is Sweet Serket and it's my name in the big lights up top so you better remember who's signing your pay-check!”  
“Um, that would be me,” the manager murmured from where he was keeping pace behind her, marching along with a determined crouching, limping motion.  
Sweet Serket span round, and the manager nearly collided with her doughty bosom.  
“Darn tooting, cute thing, now where are my manners- man alive, I near forgot to mention! Ladies, say hello to your manager Mister Nitram, if you have any troubles, turmoil, tumult or travails you just let him know, he's the boss around here, see?”  
“Um, that's right, yes, and I just wanted to say-”  
“Quiet dear, it's time for girl talk. So hands up- who's never sailed with Serket before?”  
A collection of nervous hands raised up in the air. Eridan glanced at Sollux and shrugged, as they raised their own hands as well.  
“Jiminy crickets, hands up girls, up, up up! I want to see those hands! One, two three... look at that! Eight new faces joining us. Must be a sign, it's my lucky number. Now here's a little something I like to lay on the line every time some cute young thing thinks of signing up with Sweet Serket for an easy ride and some fast money.”

She paused, smiling at them fondly, and patted an errant curl back into place.

“Forget it! If you want to make it as a Swinging Siren then you have have to work had, play straight, and show me some spunk! You aren't going to get anywhere in this world without SPUNK!”  
She suddenly clapped a hand on Eridan's shoulder. He sat rigidly and stared straight ahead, swallowing in fear as she addressed him.  
“Do you think you have the SPUNK to make it on this trip, girly?”  
Eridan tried to titter girlishly, sending his voice straight up into a falsetto register.  
“Well,” he stammered, “I might surprise you!”  
“Ha! That's the spirit, right there! I like your spunk!” She clapped Eridan's shoulder again, hard enough to rattle his teeth, and he just about managed another titter.

By now Serket had moved on, and as she spoke she counted off her rules on her fingers.  
“One! No men! I won't put up with any horseplay, hootenannies, hootchy-cootchy or howdy-do! We're here to work, ladies, and men only foul things up, you take it from me I know.”  
Eridan and Sollux shared a panicked glance.  
“Two! No booze! I won't put up with any foul-mouthed lewdness in my band. We're a classy act, and that's both on and off stage. I expect nothing less then perfect ladylike behaviour at all times. That means no hip-flasks, no secret gin-stills, no bathtub rotgut and especially no toilet whiskey. I know all the tricks, ladies, so don't even try it!”  
Sollux looked as though his eyes would fall out of his head, and Eridan was looking at him with an expression of mute, shocked glee.  
“Are you getting this, man?” Eridan whispered, “these girls? Butter uw-wouldn't melt! Uw-what's she talking about, these frails uw-wouldn't know a hit of gin from a shot of uw-water!”  
“I know, right? Sheesh, I bet half of them never had anything thtronger then thathaparilla!”  
“Just stay cool brother, uw-we'll keep our heads down, an' be good little girls too, eh?”

They chuckled, and elbowed one another amusedly. At that moment a doughty redhead squeezed into the seat next to Sollux, doing something expert with her hip that somehow sent him careening against Eridan and squashing them both up against the window side of the bench.  
“Hi girls! Listen, could you do a sister a solid, real quick?”  
“Um,” Eridan coughed and tried to titter again, “uw-well, I'm sure if uw-we could render any assis-”  
“That's solid gone, hon, here hold this for me-”  
Before they could say anything she had reached- into- her bra and produced a half of purest Kentucky rye which she pushed into the horrified Sollux's hands.  
“Serket's a real bloodhound for booze-hounds, if you know what I mean. She caught me out one time, and I swear she's had it in for me ever since, just hold on to it for me, okay? She'll never think of checking out the fresh meat though. You're all right, you know that? Really helping out a doll in need!”

There was no time to argue before she was gone again. Sollux gaped at the bottle and at Eridan, who shrugged and motioned frantically. Sollux secreted the bottle within his own generously accommodating brassiere. The thing was awkward and hard and very uncomfortable, and he had no idea how she had managed to hold on to the thing.  
“Oh my God,” he breathed, “what jutht happened?”  
“I dunno,” Eridan hissed, “that's Old Redeye, too! That stuff can strip the paint off uw-walls, uw-what's a chick doing uw-with it?”  
Sollux clasped him tightly all of a sudden. “We're in too deep! I dunno what'th going on any more, we're learning thtuff we weren't meant to know!”  
Eridan rubbed his chin thoughtfully, “I dunno, maybe this could be kinda' educational.”  
“You're a real loon thometimeth, I dunno why I-”

Before he could finish, he realised something had changed. Eridan's expression, opposite him across the narrow table between their seats, had frozen, fixed. He frowned and swivelled in his seat, and couldn't help but whistle under his breath at what he saw.

She had a way of moving that made it seem as if there was an internal motor involved, she prowled down the aisle and patted a hand to her exquisitely coiffed hair carelessly. She was practically poured into a tight white dress and filled out every nook and cranny just perfectly. In her other hand she carried a small case, she was obviously a latecomer to the band. She just simpered and smiled as the other girls welcomed her aboard- better late then never.

“Hold... the phone...” Eridan breathed.  
“You thaid it, brother,” Sollux agreed.

Sweet Serket was less then impressed and clapped a hand to one hip as she swivelled and gave the new girl a vicious, piercing glare.  
“What, what do you know,” she drawled, “a perfect example of rule three. Don't ever be late to a gig! This is a classy act, ladies, and when Sweet Serket says her Swinging Sirens will take to the stage on time, you had better not make a liar out of me!” She nodded dismissively and pointed a perfectly rouged and buffed fingernail at the newcomer, “so what's the story this time, Roxy? Got a better excuse for me this time?”  
“Well gee I don't know,” the girl breathed back at her, “I guess I just lost track of time or something. You know I never had the best of luck in alarm clocks,”  
Behind her, one young wag snickered, “yeah, or men,”  
“Quiet!” Sweet Serket was not in even the small amount of the mood she could ever be said to be in, “you little minxes better shape up and fly right! You're on your last warning with me, Roxy! I can always find a new ukelele strummer and don't you forget it! Now get settled, we're on our way girls!”

There was a general whooping and cheering as the train juddered out of the station at last and rattled out of town. The trip would last through the night and all of the bandmembers had been assigned a narrow bunk in the females-only sleeping car. Before they were ready for bed, however, the girls all caught up on the gossip and rumours since the band had last been together, and generally raised up a party atmosphere. Sweet Serket herself retreated to her own larger cabin before long, discreetly leaving her girls to it. Sollux and Eridan took it all in and began, very quickly, to realise that the girls had something of a language of their own when they were among themselves, a thought which had never occurred to the men before. It was fascinating, in fact, just to listen to the outrageous tales of debauchery and tomfoolery they came up with, more then one of which brought a blush to Sol's cheeks.

In the middle of it all Roxy was reclining like a queen surrounded by adoring courtiers. She was something of a mascot to the other girls, who put up with her dizzy ways and, frankly, ridiculous habits because she was just so adorable. Eridan patted a passing bassist on the elbow awkwardly, and pulled her into the adjoining seat for a quick conference.  
“Hey listen doll- uh- darlin', that Roxy is sure a firecracker, right?”  
“You said it sweetheart, she's always either getting into or just got out of some trouble or other.”  
“So uw-what's her deal, anyuw-ways?”  
“Well,” the girl leaned over conspiratorially, “I'd never be one to spread gossip, you understand,”  
“Oh cross my heart and hope to die, believe me I know about keepin' a secret or two,”  
“So the story goes, she likes a drink, that's her problem. Keeps on hitting the sauce and then, what do you know, some bar-room lug starts looking like a regular Casanova, you get my drift?”  
“That so?”  
“It's so, it's so! She can't help herself, poor dear. A drop too many and land's sakes, she just about swoons into bed!” The girl raised the back of her hand to her forehead and pouted dramatically to demonstrate, before going back to the rest of the girls. Eridan turned to Sollu excitedly. Sollux was already giving him a look.  
“Hot-dog! You hear that?”  
“You can't be theriouth.”  
“I'm sorry, but did you see those hips? How d'you expect me to just sit here and do nothing? I'm not a machine, you know.”  
“You're definitely thome kind of machine.”  
“I can't help it, I'm dizzy for this dame!”  
“I get it, Jack, but what are you gonna do? Do I need to remind you that there'th a nithe little jam waiting for uth back home?”  
“Well, we're Jazz-men, right?”  
“Right,”  
“So what do Jazz-men do?”  
“Thyncopate?”  
“Improvise! I need to borrow this, sorry-”  
Eridan expertly snaked a hand down Sollux's top and snagged the bottle of rye.  
“Oh, oh no, don't you dare! You monthter!”  
“Me?” Eridan trilled in a piping falsetto, “I just uw-want to get the party swinging!”

The engine whistle screamed as the train plowed on into the night.


End file.
